Far Cry 6 seems to be the most Far Cry game ever to Far Cry. While it does appear to lean in harder to the political undertones of the series, casting you as a guerilla fighter taking on a tyrannical regime on the island of Yara - a place visually inspired by Cuba, with a “guerilla fantasy” feeling taken from the Cuban uprising, but with the political commentary supposed to be wider and less focused on Cuba specifically. Personally, I think it feels a little gross to use a pastiche of a very real socialist uprising then try to distance your game from the specific politics of that movement for something more watered down and safe, but I get it. Politics is complicated. What I get less is the insistence on wedging the wacky, zany Far Cry-ness into a story that wants to be taken seriously. Regardless of where you stand on that admittedly controversial issue though, there is one thing we should probably all have already been in agreement on - cockfighting is fucking gross.
Far Cry 6 has a few tonally awkward elements I have already written about prior to launch. The DLC linking up with Stranger Things and Danny Trejo’s taco truck, for example, or how the cute and silly dog is an unnecessary distraction from the staunch political stance the game wishes to take. But cockfighting is not tonally awkward. It’s not something that just doesn’t fit with Far Cry’s big ideas, or makes it hard to believe the sincerity with which the game claims to treat its story. It’s just, again, fucking gross.
I don’t feel I should have to expand on that, or come up with alternate ways of phrasing it. It’s making animals fight each other in bloody, brutal combat for sport. This is not just a passing thing mentioned by the game either, nor just a throwaway line in a file only the most dedicated players will encounter. There is a full Tekken-style fighting minigame where you take control of one rooster and try to claw and peck your opponent to death as he shrieks in agony, bloody feathers aflutter. PETA Latino has spoken out on this issue, but few others have.
I’m not a vegan. I try to incorporate more vegan substitutes into my diet, both for environmental and ethical reasons, but I understand that I still eat meat, and some of those animals that meat comes from were probably treated poorly. There is no ethical consumption under capitalism. But cockfighting is not the same. The ways to change the ways animals in the meat industry are treated is to go vegan where possible, pressure companies into more ethical treatment, and look for organic, free range, cruelty free products. The ways to change the cockfighting industry is simple - just don’t do cockfighting.
Cockfighting is not even, as some equestrian lovers like to claim of their own sport, a way to bond with the animal or give it purpose. It’s cruelty in its basest form. That it’s in the game is bad enough - it feels like someone Googled ‘Latin culture’ and pulled out the five coolest things and stuck them in a PowerPoint all about Yara. But to be not just glorified as a minigame, not just one you witness, but one you actively participate in by ripping a cockerel to shreds, feels disgusting, even for video games. Ten years ago this would have been a bit much. In 2021 it’s so far over the line everyone seems ready to dismiss it entirely, out of sight and out of mind. It’s almost too gross, that mentioning it at all feels vulgar. But things like this shouldn’t be happening in our medium anymore. I don’t care how fun it is. Where are our standards? Where are our bare minimums?
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Video games have an incredibly violent past, but actively spotlighting cockfighting, and leaning into the the apparent silliness of it with the Tekken aesthetic, is (just one more time) fucking gross.
Why is this a thing we’re okay with? Why is this a thing that’s happening? The joy it takes in animal cruelty feels so much more upsetting than the graphic violence many video games, Far Cry included, are known for. It’s senseless violence, in service of nothing but a cheap laugh, and is the absolute worst of the medium. I’ve taken pot shots at Far Cry previously, but it’s all in good fun. I get that people like the mix of serious themes and nonsensical action, even if I find it difficult to swallow. This though? Virtual cockfighting in a triple-A game in 2021? We’re better than this, or at least we should be.